“The American people want someone to articulate their rage for them,” the manically motivated television director of programming Diane Christensen, pitched perfectly in the key of shrill by Faye Dunaway, tells her staff in “Network,” the 1976 film that took satire to a new and prophetic level in American filmmaking.

Who knew it would turn out to be a terrifying glimpse into a future of paranoia, rage and the power of a fourth network to not only sway public opinion but blur — or perhaps obliterate — the line between truth and fiction.

Forty-two years later, “Network” is on Broadway as a play at a time where that very sentence — and dozens of others from Paddy Chayefsky’s not-a-word-wasted screenplay — are almost jaw-dropping in their relevancy to today’s fractured and embittered America.

And as the director Ivo van Hove’s new stage version proves, the power of “Network” is its portrayal of how the public feeds on the promise of a savior — even an angry one. The rage that pours out of Howard Beale, the film’s fallen angel of a newsman who is pushed out of his anchor chair only to become a voice box for the fed-up average Joe and Jane, was a rare public display on a fictitious TV network that felt all too real. But in the waning days of 2018, public airing of rage is a minute-by-minute spew-fest on Twitter or your choice of the social media du jour. Somehow “Network” feels almost touchy-feely nostalgic.

This is perhaps what is almost negating about adapting “Network” to the stage. Mr. van Hove and his creative team have certainly updated this version with the technology of in-your-face video and a modern TV studio set (though still set in the late ’70s). The actor Bryan Cranston embodies Howard Beale with a similar desperation and pent-up bitterness that earned Peter Finch a posthumous Oscar for best actor. The wrinkles in Mr. Cranston’s weary face are a performance unto themselves.

But “Network” is a time capsule. For those of us who came of age during the glory years of the holy trinity of ABC, CBS and NBC, the power of “Network” was its absurd idea: a fourth network, fictitiously called UBS, which is the underdog network that dares to usurp that trifecta with provocative programming and what is ostensibly a reality TV show that blends news and slanted political interpretations to prey on Americans’ fears. Ring a bell?

So as this fourth-network scenario came true in America — along with cable TV and the present-day onslaught of premium channels and the comfortably numbing power of quality shows on HBO, Showtime, Netflix and others — “Network” has remained not just a period piece but an almost psychically inspired glimpse into the future. It is that rare gem of American cinema that is both dated and ultimately timeless and most certainly a bellwether of how America has lurched forward over the decades. Other such films could be “Sunset Boulevard” (Hollywood abandoning its silent-film stars for sound and fury) or “Dr. Strangelove” (an equally brilliant satire at the height the Cold War) or “Midnight Cowboy” (an X-rating and Best Picture Oscar winner during the tumult of the Vietnam War).

Much of the success of “Network” was its relevancy to the news at the time: the post-Watergate malaise and sense of betrayal by a president who flat-out lied to the American public (imagine!); the abduction of the heiress Patty Hearst; the two attempts on President Gerald Ford’s life; the rise of homegrown American terrorism by political activists; the corporate takeover of television networks. There is a sort of innocence to these events from the perspective of our far more volatile world. Kidnapped heiresses! Good heavens!

Howard Beale is described in the film as “a latter-day prophet denouncing the hypocrisies of our time,” but this line loses its gut punch when it’s done every few minutes on social media. “I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take it anymore” — the now-cliché legacy of “Network” in which he urges Americans to shout their rage — means little when our windows and rooftops are in our palms. There can be no unique and uniting voice — no Howard Beale to embody our collective angst — when we all posses the ability to rage at random like a petulant child. An angry white man promoting anger on television for popularity, and perhaps even ratings, is no longer a novelty. It’s a bit of a bore. Take note, President Trump.

Perhaps the most revealing moment in “Network” comes near the beginning when Ms. Dunaway’s character and her colleague, played by Robert Duvall, realize that Howard Beale’s ratings are skyrocketing — that the more he loses it on the air, the higher the ratings go. They can no longer ignore the fact that a divided, soul-crushed America wants an unhinged anchorman to lead them to salvation.

“We’re talking about putting a manifestly irresponsible man on network television,” Mr. Duvall’s character says, to which Ms. Dunaway nods ever so gentle obviousness, but tinged with menace and power.

Viewed from 2018, that’s a chilling moment — one burned on celluloid from the dizzying bicentennial year of 1976. People might see this film in 50 to 100 years as a nostalgic depiction of old media, complete with wisecracking journalists in period costume. Viewers may not make the connection to its prophetic vision of the future, just as we don’t see, say, “The Front Page” as depicting the power of newspapers in 1920s America. “Network” captures a moment in time when network television was nearing the end of its reign. Perhaps that’s all its legacy will be in half a century.

“She’s television generation. She learned life from Bugs Bunny,” William Holden’s character tells his wife, played by Beatrice Straight in a contained bit of Oscar-winning rage, when asked if he is in love with his new mistress, played by Ms. Dunaway in her prime. “The only reality she knows comes to her from over the TV set.”

Ah, to see “Network” from such a viewing platform: learning life from a sarcastic cartoon rabbit and being swayed by just a TV set in your living room.

David Belcher is an editor in the Hong Kong office of the Opinion section.

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